414. Blender Brain

This is Do By Friday, a weekly challenge podcast with Alex Cox and Merlin Mayor. This week's challenge? Let's try that again about 5% slower. Hello Merlin Man. Hello Alex, how are you? I thought I was good, but you know, we'll do I suppose a little Behind the curtain, am I in trouble based on the Zoom profile photo you have? Is this a sign? Okay. Okay. Why do you have a m uh you have as your profile picture A uh sh uh frame from Manhunter that I don't remember, but it is I think a serial killer's symbol of some sort. And maybe this is your way of communicating something. You would have never yeah, I I have no basis for this. You've never done anything like this before. Right. No um exactly. That's the problem.

Do um do I or other people communicate with you through their avatar choices? I mean, let me put it differently. A lot people are constantly contacting you. Um, do other people communicate with you through their avatar choices, their public avatar choices? Yes. Okay. But is that is that a form of trolling or is it bonding? Oh no, trolling. No. Or is it a big thing? People contact me, but we don't bond ooh, bonding. Is it like a kink or is just a little bit of a kid? Um no, uh I didn't intend to, but if I were What's the thing? So I think what Alex is talking about is is my little uh image, which I changed sometimes. He didn't remark at all when it was a submarine captain. Because I didn't know the bit.

I just knew it was from the journal. Because you didn't know the bit home. Oh you did know that. But she never thought to remark on that as a way of tele tel tele uh tele uh tele uh tele tela Graphing. With my eyes, my blinks, because I can't stand up. Sassy as you please, how many candles you got. I don't know what you've gotta stick with one thing then. Well one thing I stick with is I refer to the same Maria Bamford thing every single week and you never know what it is. No! I didn't watch things 50 times. I'm very busy with documents. I have scaffolding to build. Oh what? No, uh I always know it's either from the Christmas, uh the Christmas special or the But you didn't even know it was Maria Bamford, did you?

No, it could have been Chris Fleming or John Mullaney or one of the other things you've claimed to watch. It could have it could have been one of the many British stand-up comedy bits that I have not watched, but it seemed So many. So this is a picture of Bill Tanch um holding up a legal pet. I think that's the Zodiac symbol, I believe. I'm not positive, but it's I think they're talking in the context of how BTK, uh his name's Dennis. How BTK uh came up. Now do you know that bit? Uh n no. Anyways we're like uh it's you're just you're a cultural void in the sweetest way. Um it's um it's uh no I just have thirty y years of uh th yes, there's a thirty year void where I did not exist. So uh at this thirty years correct From nineteen seventy to nineteen ninety?

Okay. Is that thirty years or is it twenty years? Um and so uh they were talking about I think they were talking about how, you know, if you if you watch that program Uh BTK comes up with a symbol of his own and he's doing that thing that people do that it's like Boy Scouts do, like where you can make something out of your initials. So he makes uh uh a logotype, as you say. As it says BTK, but if you notice, the real heads will notice the B also kind of looks like boobs. Not in this one, but in BTKs. His name's Dennis. Oh, okay. He's the guy who works for ADT. He's his name is Dennis. I it's not from I think Eve. No, one thing at a time. What what is it you think um what is it you felt bad about when you saw Bill Tanch holding up a legal pad?

What did you imagine I was telegraphing with my eyelids to you? Uh per perhaps it was a tr a trap. This might have been a trap because I by the way. Why why why? Okay. Alright, well I'm sorry I made you feel bad. Is there um It doesn't make me feel bad? Sometimes I like traps. You know. Whoa. If if if we keep souvenirs? BTK kept souvenirs. He would lay them out on the bed and then do his special his special uh ritual The entire time we were watching this show, the two seasons of this show, because I don't always remember when things happen and you know compression happens, but There's a scene in Mindhunter that I just remember and I'd said to Billy the whole time we were watching this, we just finished it last week, and I'd said the entire time I said, look, you know, well occasionally I would say, uh just so you know, I think there's a scene coming up.

And like, you know, my kids cool, so it's not a problem. But I was like, there's actually there's one scene in this that I found really quite upsetting. And I thought it happened way earlier in season two, but as it turns out, it happens at the end of the last episode. of season two. And it's when we see BTK with his with his uh with his souvenirs and he puts on a a a special mask Uh do you remember that scene? I don't. This blurs together with the monster series. Uh well, those scenes, uh actually, but the m the monster series on Netflix and There's well there's a lot of special things and a lot of masks made out of body parts. What's that honey? What is what is Monster Thing on Netflix? Monster is another show on Netflix about cereal.

Kill uh no, it's a it's another serial killer themed show on Netflix. Okay, but it's not as good. And there's a lot of people. Uh uh you know what? One of the seasons, yes. He's in that terrible show, The Waterfront, which is like the least good B Plus show I've watched this year. Um no, I don't think so. Uh BTK bind torture kill. Um but related to that And I wanna I wanna just throw it to you because you have so much prepared for this episode. I just wanna say a nice thing that I heard today. It's uh we're we're this is I think the week or the month that uh the musical Hamilton is ten years old. And I saw an article today I saw an article today that I thought was really cool, and which is that there's a person who's been in Hamilton like the entire time.

on Broadway or I guess, you know, on, you know, in the the official production for for the full ten years. Do do you know which person that is? No. Uh Samuel Seabury. Oh not the rebel who scream revolution. And then the reason I think of it here, the reason it's contextual here is first of all, I was I was thinking about that today and how it makes me happy. And according to this um article on the internet I saw he's still having a great time with it. And they give him different jobs, like he's been an understudy for John Lawrence. He's um had lots of different things. But uh no, this one guy for that entire time. How cool is that that he's had a job for ten years on Broadway? That's pretty neat, I think.

That's extremely cool. Then do you remember how that song ends? You remember how Farmer Refuted ends He says they go silence. They say silence. A message from the king. Oh, and and and I'll perform it for you now. Please do, please do a message from the king, a message from the king, a message from the king. you say I love him so much. Ple I love Jonathan Groff. I think he's funny. He's he's just you can't wipe off that gay. You can't wipe off that level of gay. So there's just all the time we're watching this in the same way that Anna Torv, if she's not a lesbian in real life, she's missing her best bet. I mean she attracts a cat with tuna in the whole nine. And but no, but like Holden Ford, Holden Ford, I b I barely knew him.

I never saw I never saw the San Francisco gay show with the guy from White Lotus, but my wife says it's good. Did you ever watch that? Looking? Did you ever watch Looking? I heard it's good. No. I don't know. That's the Jonathan Groff show with him and um uh the the the um not the Maitre D, the guy at the desk from White Lotus with the drugs. That wonderful actor. The guy the guy from um the guy the guy who is um the guy who is Ron Swanson's boyfriend in um The Last of Us. See, I'm uh I'm a void. I actually oh no, I have seen that. Congratulations to the guy who plays Samuel Seabury on ten years, ten years running. Silence. Congratulations to uh Mar M Miguel Serv Cervante. I forget how to say his name, but he The author of Don Quixote.

You know he rode a donkey and not a horse. I haven't learned that yet. What did Miguel Cervantes have to do with Hamilton? He that's not his his name, but he was running Hamilton until No, of course, you mean um um Sancho Panza. In uh World War II he served in. No, no, it's Sancho Panza, he served in the Ponza division. It was uh part of uh Blitzkrieg. And the French, you know, with the Maginot Wall, they had uh butzkrieg in Fro Shout and Freyda. A lot of people are hard on the Maginot line, but it worked better than a lot of people say. It still did what it was supposed to do. Well, I mean the thing is it had been sold to people as like this impregnable uh wall. that would prevent the Germans from coming in.

I mean I'm not gonna go into a whole thing about it. You can watch videos about it if you're me. But um but you know it still it kind of did what it was meant to do. It's just that the Maginot line as I understand it turned on the idea that was it the Ardennes that that it ends at this forest that it would be impossible for anybody to do an attack through. Do you know what I mean? It's like it's why we don't put fences on the ocean. I don't I didn't I know I just fence everything, Alex. If you fence everything, there's no planet left There has to be an area. Do you know about Chesterton's fence? No. Okay. I you can just take it away. I wouldn't worry about it. Um but but the thing of it is it's neat because you know it's a tough racket uh being in show biz.

It's from Bill Hayes. Bill Hayter's impression of Lauren Michaels, which involves an impression that Conan O'Brien likes, where Bill Hader does an impression of Lauren Michaels. where he um he gets he rubs his eyes and gets frustrated anytime he has to There we go. Okay, sorry. It was in uh Gone to um gone to not Wichita, where you say I'd gone to you know to gone to Kansas uh with Marcy to get BTK off death row. You you you need to do the best part which is uh Lauren these hands. Oh so I was uh Oh yeah yeah now you remember now you remember And and then uh the the he the Jeffrey Dahmer, he goes, Well, I know I know where you're going. Yeah. So anyways, um, and the reason he wasn't at SNL 50 was that you know he has uh chronic anxiety problems.

I just read that today. Have you ever heard Bill Hader talk about anxiety? It's pretty cool. He's very cool about it. It's not a bit, you know, it's like it's a thing for him. And I I I think it's very cool that he talks about it. Is anxiety a bit for anyone? I don't want to know the answer to that. Never mind. I don't I just I just mean it's it like I don't know why. It reminds me of uh so I was usually in high school I would be friends with people who were older and or smarter than I. And like for example my um my lab mate Is that what it's called? Yeah, my lab mate in Kim was um my friend Kim. And uh because all girls were called Kim then. And she and she would always go, Oh, I know I gotta feel that I know I feel that test.

And of course she always got an A plus. We were one of those people, grade grubbers, people like you. You know what I'm saying? I was not a grade grubber. That's that's a kind of bit Is like if you know if you're just doing that to go like it's just it's kind of unseemly to people who get C's in chemistry for what it's worth. But you know, you go like that's a bit. So it's going only heavy off stage fright, mm. Like, you know, where you make it a bit, like for an interview. It's not a bit with him. He's got anxiety. Well uh yeah, I think you're conflate y I think you're conflate. So I I c you're you're conflating being a dick with uh no, I guess I guess you're right. I was I was just merely pointing out that Bill Hader seems like a down-to-earth person whose interest in movies and culture and the kind of if you ever heard Bill Hader talk about movies, boy he really loves movies.

It's really cool to hear him talk about it. And he's really smart and he seems to have self-awareness and he seems pretty cool. He should be in more of them. He is He can, he's got anxiety out, it's not a bit. Maybe you picked the wrong job. Maybe you should have diffused bombs or some shit. Well then you uh end up with your hands uh in a body uh like uh in Grey's Anatomy. They weren't diffusing a bomb, they were removing it from Christina Ricci. Read a book. I know. Um must be nice, goodness. It's interesting because she's small, but she has both a large face and a large head. I always think that's so interesting. I think people's proportions are fascinating. I don't talk about the way people look.

No, we don't do that anymore. Oh wow. Now I'm just You got so much to talk about in this document here. You created two documents for this where you're sending me links, you got things you want me to look at, you're you're changing the style guide of things And and but now you also got all this prep that you have. You've got all these bullets here of things you want to talk about. So I want to give you the opportunity to talk about, I'm sure you're going to want to talk about the bride on a string, la la la. There's lots of things I figured you want to talk about. I'm just trying to give you an opportunity. Okay, well then follow up from the first time. Who do you call to get that installed? It's me, Juline Maxwell.

He was all I am uh fully English. In this version I speak with uh accent Francis. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. We have a corpse bride. We need a hanging from a rope in our foyer. Oh yes, yes, yes. It's the seven story building no one is allowed in. Are you able to hang that from my sky? How you say? I looked at it over and over. What we're talking about here isn't is uh Uh slightly overrated. New York Times article on Whoa, all the crazy stuff in Jeffrey Epstein's house, which we've known about for years. But it features as its primary hero image an absolutely astonishing image of a decoration. How would you describe it? It's is as I recall, it's sort of like In my head anyway, it like hangs sort of like the hanging uh no spoilers for the Haunted Mansion ride, but kind of like the hanging person that you see overhead in the elevator I m just immediately thought, oh, imagine the that's a harbinger of the future right there in the concept of the city.

Um no, uh just about h his demise. And I'm like, hmm, that not that we've seen the video. The first owner is the haunted mansion or Walt? You're implying he's a hatbox ghost? No, um I'm I'm in planting. I used to have a crush. I used to have a crush on that lady. I used to have a crush on that uh on that lady in the crystal ball I thought she was I thought she was sexually very enticing when I was a child. The one who's just ahead? Is it m madam madam I I don't care. I don't care. I don't own ears Not a Disney adult. The neither are you. There is no such thing as a Disney adult. You have peanuts on a page and you've written down some stuff. You've written down a challenge. You wrote it way too long, so I made it properly short.

You've started doing this thing where you say potential titles, and I don't like that. I changed that. Now you've got four bits of stuff you want to talk about here. I'm guessing one of them is about pussy eating. No. Continue. It's not about pussy eating. If you'll remember, last week's uh challenge was to make a show document. And so I made Oh, so it's not about nine volt batteries. Uh no, we it's oh boy. See, this is why there's there's a wonder you're so unsuccessful in relationships. You've you've never gone downtown for lunch? Wow. I've uh I wasn't going to mention that. I don't know what you people do. You take two pairs of scissors, you take two pairs of pairs of scissors and you duel.

I've never said that. I've never thought that. I've never been. A BuzzFeed Berkeley. BuzzB. Berkeley. A BuzzFeed Berkeley. I can't want to hear any more about tables. Buzzfeed. Buzzfeed Berkeley tight. Oh, that's a terrible name. Buzzfeet. Buzzfeet. Buzzfeed Berkeley. Wow. Wow. Must be nice. Oh god. Last week's challenge was to make a show document and uh I uh made my little thing. Yes. And so I uh did a thing. We uh looked at it last week. Your certainty is delicious and uncalled for. And this oh week you said I I I don't use Notion and I'm like, okay, that's fine. No Alex, Alex honey, you send me links with absolutely no context. And I I I feel like there's a thing I've said to you numerous times.

And you th you probably think it's a bit. I don't click things that you send me unless I know what it is and why I'm looking at it. I know people need to send you s screenshots. It's a funny bit. But like when you send me something that doesn't even have a thumbnail And it's just a thing that says sign in to see this. I when people send me Instagram things, I can't see that. I don't have Instagram. When people send me TikTok I can't I might be able to see like a public preview of it, but I can't s I don't click on things that say login to look at this. And when you send me something in Notion with absolutely no context, my response is, okay, I don't generally do a lot in Notion. Like I I guess I still got an account.

But you're not going to be able to do that. But I don't know what it is. I don't know why you're sending it to me. Uh that's that's fine. I didn't know. I know it is. That's why I'm telling you. You keep doing it. Hi. Do you need me for this one? And then I sent another link, which is a g a Google Doc that has, yes, some follow-up From the things we talked about last week, as well as topics where I specifically said just things Alex found during the week that Merlin has mentioned or might like. No, like you're not going to be able to do that. You should say so. You don't need to do it by sending documents. You can just say I want to be your friend. We can do that. I I would love to do that. We could like talk about music or something.

I don't really need anybody to talk to about these things. What I don't need is more documents. I don't need homework from my friends. You don't need Here's things. I've there's a sense in there where I claim to like you. I don Well there's no sense. You know what you are? You're an enchanted tiki break. I mean a mmm They closed that, didn't they? No, they brought it back. Oh good. It's got a new sign. I watched a lot of Disney videos. Because I'm a Disney adult. But you don't own ears. I'm I don't own ears. I'm a Disney retiree. I think we got I got we got young William some ears. We have a really cute photo of William wearing some ears and and holding um Uh who's the girl cat Simba, maybe? I don't know.

Whatever the girlcat is. I'll find it it's really cute. Mulva? Mulva. Vulva. No, Mulva with an M. Everyone's favorite. I'll find it. It's really cute. And we're at that fried chicken place with Pavilion Place. Don't like thinking about oh the animation. I' Um because because your interior world must be fascinating. Why my interior world is m my nieces are having a Lion King phase and awesome Indeed. And I just don't wanna think about vulvas or round nala. And I see Nala a lot. Oh, look at that. Okay. The photo you sent me, I think that's Simba. That seems like a It's like, oh is that I just can't wait to be king. Who's that guy? Who sings that song? The Michael Jackson song? Who sings that? Uh, the king be a mighty king.

You other king's beware. You know that song? Eric just can't wait to be king. Is that the one? What's his name? Yeah. Simba? I think it's it's not Eric Matthews band. Eric Matthews band. Yes, I think you're actually. That was kind of funny. That was kind of funny. Well no, it's a band called Rick Matthews band. Um and these are pictures of my kid wearing ears and oh and look at that little uh was that a Monsters Inc. hat Is that what it is? Or Monsters University? Yeah, Monsters University. Oh, look at that little kid. Oh, this is a funny time. This is uh when my little kid used to dress like they're going to prep school. And now and now he started doing it again. He went out and picked out his own he went he went down uh went down to uh uh uh s uh uh one of the big malls down south.

Did a whole day of school shopping all on his own, drove a car there, came back with an entire muted fall basically you ever been to California, you've never been to California Adventure. But like if you do you know are you familiar with like the um I shouldn't talk about my kit, but basically he looks like a sign for Yosemite. He's awesome. He wears like all green, green and brown tones. He basically looks like signage for a national park. And he buys pants he buys pants that fit now. It's so fucking cool. Oh he's an adult. I mean you you shouldn't talk about your kid, but you shouldn't talk about your a young adults uh either. Oh my goodness. The when you said prep though, I I thought of uh what is your definition of prep?

Because I kind of went to the prep school definition and thought of the pre- I mean prep war I I I mean because I think of it perhaps unfairly, I think of it uh it became slightly disparaging. But a term from my junior high and high school years was preppy. You'd say a preppy. Like I had the preppy handbook, for example. And there was a song. There was a preppy rap. Did you know that there was a rap about being a preppy? No, please share. Oh, there's only one couple that I remember from it. And it's this guy, and now when I do it, it's gonna either sound like Tim Gunn or Humpty Hump. But what I remember was this guy rapping about being he's about being a preppy And I remember he's talking about his girlfriend.

I think her name's like uh I think her name's um her name's like Muffy McAdoo or something like that. His girlfriend has a preppy name. And then at one point he says, I fixed Mr. McAdoo's old BMW by adjusting the anti sway bar. I remember that from probably 1982. Uh dopy rap. I fixed Mr. McAdoo's old PMW by adjusting the anti-sway bar. Make it work. It's a doing because I'm about to ruin the image and the style that you're used to. I look funny, but yo, I'm making money. Gee. Hope world, hope you're ready for me. You're kind of doing hair. Yeah, the rounds when you fool in town and sounds laid down by the underground. I'll drink up all the hennessy you got on your shelves, so just let me introduce myself.

My name is Humpty. Uh pronounce with the empty. Yes, ladies. Oh how I love to funk thee. And all the rappers in the top ten, please allow me to bump thee bump thee. I'm standing tall, y'all, and just like Humpty Dumpty. Uh so I wanna watch a piece uh He once got busy in a Burger King bathroom is the point. Okay, good. That's a that that was that was a year before you were born that came out. Yeah. It was like a rip br you know that song No. The hump dee dance is your chance to do the hump. Do my baby. You don't know this song? No. What what was that? What was that? Do that again? Do it. Birr br rip. Is that a ring cut? Well, it does kind of sound like a vibrating razor phone. Yeah, that does.

It does. It sounds like the the razor phone when it goes like vibrating razor phone. You know the razor phone. No, I understand. It's a Motorola joke. I get it. It's not a Motorola joke. It's it sounds Who made the razor, Alex? I'm sorry, am I confused? Who made the very sexy razor phone? It's a joke about mo Just trying to match your energy, man. I don't know what the fuck you're doing here. I came in I came in and I said I made myself a coffee and I says to myself, I says I says, you know what? I'm just gonna let Alex go wherever they want to go with this. And that's what what's that's what's happened and now we can never release this. Yeah, here's us on a ride together. What ride is that? Here's us on.

Oh, it's us on. . Oh, oh, it's on the cars ride. Oh, the cars ride is really good here. You wait a long time for it, but it's a really good ride. What happens on the cars ride? You know what it is? It's it's like it's if if you watch Disney videos, like you know, like I don't know, there's been a lot of developments I I feel like in rides in the last 20 years You know, for a big for a long time it was the OmniMover, you know, platform that they made originally for, I think, the World's Fair that then got used on the Wedweight People Mover, and then of course got used on Automansion. Um, this is a combination roller coaster and themed ride in uh in the Radiator Springs. And it's it's pretty cool.

This is us, I'll send you a photo. This is us in a in a blue car with eyes. Anyways, I like going to Disneyland. I'm not gonna go anymore though. It sounds too costly. Everything costs now. Although I do want to I kind of want to go I kind of want to go to Star Wars. Um so I'm gonna close that. Hey, so what else do we got here? You've got um you take it anywhere. Did you want to talk? Did you want to talk about that? Uh you seem like you've wanted to talk about the manual The manual, the oh the I'm going to intersection that begins you have a section called topic. It has four bullets under it. Singular, yes. Someone added. Do you want to say potential topics? I'll type that. Oh, you're in the wrong.

Okay, I need you. I I get it. Oh my fucking Don't growl at me, madam. I didn't or No, you just growled like a lady. Go on. Go on. I misgendered nothing. A lady growl men. Nice, that looks like somebody in nine to five or something. I hate the system. That song's called nine to five. And you know that Sheena Easton had a song that was a hit in uh she's from Scotland, but in the UK, she'd had a hit song called Nine to Five. And when they released in the US, they had to change the name 'cause there was already a hit song called Nine to Five. Nine to five. So they had to call her song Morning Train. Oh, she got s uh uh wait, wait, I know it. Dolly Parton, right? Yes, Dolly Parton, that's previously 95.

It goes like this, it got it's got those eighth, eighth notes. Bunk bunk bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bum bum bum bum. It's very catchy. Ah see it tumble out of bed and I stumble to the kitchen, pour myself a cup of ambition and yawn and stretch and try to come to life. That song? Oh no. Did you go away? Nope. Did you did you mute yourself? Nope. Oh no. Nope. The the bass line went away. Okay Hello, hello? I'm here! Can you hear me? Hello? Hello? Oh fuck. Uh I am here. Nothing is muted. Everything is fine. You can't hear me Okay. Hey everybody, I'm gonna I guess we're gonna so I guess we're stopping stopping the show or something. Alex is here. Can you hear me? Hi Kenny I'm Alex Cox and I'm texting Merkling Man right now because for some reason the oh for some reason the Zoom call cut Out but only I'm still recording all of this, so this is gonna go and all that stuff Alex is saying, I can hear all of that.

It's just that Alex can't hear me for some. Alex has muted themselves and unmuted themselves. Back, I've unmuted myself. Okay. And m wow, this must be hell because Merlin can hear me. But I can't hear him. This is wonderful. I am going to leave and come back. Yep. Hey everybody. It's a lot of fun, but it is in its own way it really is a lot of work. And by that I mean you know being Alex's friend. I got a coffee here, but I'm out of seltzer. Hello, can you hear me? Can you hear me? Can you hear me, Alex? Hello. Hello. Joining. Hello. Hello, can you hear me okay? Can you hear me still? Yes, I'm okay. All right. Okay, I'm gonna start Okay everybody, I'm sorry, we'll fix this. I'll probably leave this in 'cause And then the Sheena Easton song, which in and like I say, she's from Scotland.

Uh it that was originally called 95, and then when they brought it here, it was um renamed Morning Train, which sounds a little dirty. Yeah. And she says, she says, my baby takes a morning train. He works from nine till five. And then And then she dated she dated she dated nine to five, not nine till five. That changes a lot. I don't know, Alexa not from Scotland. And then she dated Prince for a while and he he she she perform performed a song his called Sugar Walls. Sugar walls. Which I thought it was a little out of keeping with her with the tidy image. Mm-hmm. Yeah, that's you ever pull a train on a sugar wall? Oh god. God. Oh, where which which list am I looking at? Because I sent you, I was like, oh, I will just clone this as a Google Doc.

So I send you What are we doing? I sent you a Google Doc with the video. Oh my god, it's an audio podcast, Alex. What are we doing? I'm just saying I don't know. No, don't say. Do something. Do something that's funny. Don't say. Well, it's an audio podcast. No, by all means, please describe your two documents more. Uh I'm uh not uh not describing, just saying uh that I don't know which one we're looking at. Oh now I see. Uh did you uh You know, la last week you talked on reconcilable differences. That's about how you didn't think. That was very racist. Did you hear the way you said that? Last week reconcilable That's the one that's the way my grandmother would talk in Chinese restaurants. We don't do that anymore.

She would always say the uh to the to the waiter, uh, me like you fly lice, she'd say. So so is it a racism or did she think that it would help them understand her more? Because Oh, I see. The way that like when we talk when we talk to people like when we when Like when you shout at deaf people? Or no or like when you shout at people, like when you talk louder to people. Yes. There's a guy in our neighborhood, I don't see him anymore, but used to see him a lot, and I would call him Explain E guy. And he was a guy who would hang out in the coffee shop and talk to people and it would sound like they were discussing business. And I will get these for you and get the requisitions. And it always but it always sounded like he was talking to somebody who was not a native English speaker.

And I think maybe, you know, that was kind of his hang up. Okay, because I uh am in theory a native English speaker and that was a very good thing. And Yeah, but I mean you do what you can to to bridge the gulf. It's like I always say though, you know, with my Instacart shoppers or just what I call people in the neighborhood. You know, uh their English is a lot better than my Cantonese. And I think that's the way to look at it. Do you have any sort of Cantonese that you can say off the top of your head, please? Give me a break. You think I'm gonna You think I'm gonna attempt to speak Cantonese i publicly? Why not? It's not uh w You did a have you ever heard can't knees, Alex? I have, yes. I could also just I could do some Mandarin.

Either one of them, when I do it, will sound extremely racist. Whereas when I do Espanyol, I don't feel as bad. Okay. My pronunciacion and my vocabulario in Espanol is muy bueno. Everyone's always said so. C C C C Dick run. C Jane sue for damages. C. Alright, that was funny. There's a C that has an accent and a C that doesn't have an accent. But if you speak it long enough, you'll lose your accent. You can leave in a minute and a half. Did you ever watch duck soup? Hey everybody. Um what's next, Alex? And if you talk about the document, I'm gonna hang up the phone. Don't talk about the document. Say something that's that that represents the documentary. When you say the list, are you not talking about the document?

What is the list? Alex, what would you like this program to be? I would like it to be whatever you find most enjoyable and how about we do a podcast then and we talk about things instead of lists. That's what I'd like to do. I'd like I'd like you to move on to so if you've got more on here's what Alex has under a potential topic. Mm-hmm. Inside Jeffrey Epstein's Manhattan Townhouse. Uh great rejections, battery-flavored tortilla chips, and nine volt video. Now what did you want what you want to oh you also have Matt Reif is the legal guardian of the real Annabelle Dahl under follow-up. So any of those would be good and then we can talk about the challenge that we did this week. Would that be helpful?

Does that give you any guidance? Yeah, I uh would I mean you you said it. Matt Reif is the legal guardian of Annabelle now. He does not own Annabelle. No no no. He Should I know who Matt Reif is? It he's a comedian and if you don't know who Matt Reif is, that's okay. You just wanna easy prop comic? Uh an huh. He I mean it's a yes or no question. Like, no, it's not. I disagree. I disagree because there is a single prop that is I got I got up and bathed this morning so I could come here and do this. I uh really just have some feelings about Matt Reif and now he is the uh keeper. Oh man, I would love to talk about this person who I who I I have no idea. He's just a s a stand-up comic, uh sta stand-up comedian, if you will, and now he is the legal guardian of uh Annabelle the haunted doll that we'd just under his jurisdiction do you do you do you get do you become like a guardian ad lightum for a doll?

What what's the process for that? It's unclear because they he bought these. So so it's so the thing is that the doll has achieved um personhood. Yes. Okay. Yeah is but it's recognized by some kind of a government as being a a living thing that can be adopted. No it's What's his name, Nestor? It's we we briefly discussed in the after show last week, uh n n not briefly, just talked about the the Warners or the uh The warners, we are the ones who warn. Yes, and the m the previous k the the Warners. I mean they made six movies about Annabelle. I what is it? The burners. Yeah, the burners and the Werners and all the dolls. The doll people. Talking about that talking about that movie with uh um uh uh uh Viviera Framiglia or whatever her name is and the guy from Watchmen who I like.

Those movies, right? I think so. There's Did you know that her sister is on The Gilded Age? No. Plays one of my favorite characters, Gladys. The one whose face I'm always talking about. That's uh Vera Framiglia's uh sister. I don't know who any of those people are. Well maybe she's a worner or a burner or a dolly. A dollier. That's that's a that's a legal term for someone who takes care of a doll. Mm boo. Right. No. No, no. No, no. Uh Matt Rife. I don't like him. No, don't like him. Bad. Bad comedian. Okay, so it's just to say that there's a comedian that you don't like who has a doll. Who now is the guardian of a doll who may or may not be uh responsible. for the death of the previous legal guardian, which is just follow-up from last week.

It's it's breaking. It could be unrelated to the doll. Maybe he's just a murder man Possibly. I mean, what's the no, no. Um you've you've given me you there's no seeds all shells here. But the the bride, the bride hanging down, that was very upsetting to me. And I did look at it a lot. It's kind of an amazing piece. It's just that didn't it look a little bit like and again now we're back to talking about this New York Times article, but didn't it I mean I zoomed in a little bit and didn't it look kind of like like a burned corpse or something? Yes. It actually that had been buried ten years ago that somebody dug up. A little mummified, wearing a pristine bride's dress and climbing down a rope from Jeffrey Epstein's seventh floor, if you know what I mean Mm-mm, or m you know, just hanging there, if you will.

Well, she's climbing down a rope, obviously. She's an escaping bride. Yeah, I mean or uh someone hanging from a bed sheet, but her bachelor's or descending a staircase. There are many brides in art. That's three that I can think of now. You got Duchamp. Um you've got now that I'm looking at this again, it's kind of disappoint you're right. This is an underwhelming it's an underwhelming article. Oh it's fun, it's fun. It's fine. And if you're if you if you're new to the if you haven't obsessed over it like I have. It's it's a lot of interesting new stuff and you can go like, Oh, it's a picture with Bill Clinton and stuff like that. But um of a very gay picture with Bill Clinton. I had not seen the picture.

What what did you see? Where they're looking into one another's eyes and it's You know he felt really bad about his teeth and that's why he always is smirking. Huh. Jeffrey Epstein had bad teeth and knew it, and that's why he's always smirking in photos. Well that and also he's a smirky guy. Talking about the New York financier. Jeff Epstein. Best known. I think I would have heard about it. Did you watch the video? I bet you didn't. Did you watch the Jim Downey video? If if I were a professor and you were my student, I would I would ask you to find another class. Because I feel like you don't do the reserve reading. I made I literally made you a YouTube playlist last week. I made that for you.

You made it for the o audience. You I did not know that it was required uh Read, watch the thing. Nothing's required except death, Alex. You said you're my friend. I I apparently sent you a document to try to do that. What's the 9Volt video about? It was um battery taste tests? Uh yeah, a guy would be don't get many nine the thing is you don't get nine volt batteries like you used to. Like the when I was a kid, how can I put this? So think about how double A's were even in the life of this show, think how double A's have been really for like, you know, for like twenty years, like double A's or sometimes triple A's. But like that's kind of the battery for everything. When I was a kid that was nine volts.

So like my pocket quarterback that doesn't sound good. What was it called? Anyway, my my little video game had nine volt batteries, headphones you know might have nine volt batteries, like everything had a nine volt battery. And then you put it on your tongue And it has very distinctive taste and feel, especially when it's fresh. And I've uh never tasted a nine volt battery, but now I'm interested in uh might assume you have. I uh You've never taken a lady out to lunch downtown. No comment. No comment. Oh come on! You're gonna claim zero conolingus. I am going to say no comment. I don't talk no comment. No no comment. None. What a confusing way to be. I thought you young people love talking about all your fucking intercourse.

No. In fact there's a think piece every week about how uh young people don't know. Really? Where do you where do you find those? Oh God. And and and then how do they introduce you to the contents of the um the article? How do they entice you? Is there a sentence that they use to entice you? Usually like kind of a bold typeface. No, usually it's in uh an author that I thought that I like. An author. See, I was thinking of the headlines. Mm-hmm. I'm strictly. Yeah. What are the great rejections? What's that? It's like d rejection letters or something? I would like you to click on that. I will click on one thing this week. You pissed. You got Matt Reif. You got Manhattan Townhouse, you got great rejections, you got tortilla chips, and you got nine volt video.

I will click on one thing. What would you like me to click on? Great rejections. Okay. I'm clicking. God, I can't believe you're supposed to type in an interstitial window. Ugh God. Okay, uh the best rejection we ever got. Okay. Um, do I shall I read this? Oh, it's by Werner. That's why you had Werner on your mind. Mm-hmm. Yes. Well He's always on my mind though. Well no, I mean I don't know what that I all I see here is that it's signed by somebody called Werner. What I'm saying is you were claiming that uh Vera Framiglia and uh and uh Night Owl 2 were in a movie about ghost hunters with Annabelle and you said they were called Werner or Burner? Yeah, and I don't I don't remember I still don't remember their names.

The conjuring couple. Oh I see. This is funny. Okay. Oh yeah. This is great. They'll st snap together like magnets. Do you wanna do you wanna read this or shall I? I uh just w wanted to uh uh this y yes, and uh again, just a list of things that Merlin might be. I would know that though just from seeing a link in in a in a document. It's a treat. It's Chris it's Christmas again. This is why you never have time to do cool things, is you're always doing this bullshit. No, I have a lot of time right now. Um not busy. Uh so Radio Lab, which is a radio slash podcast. a radio show slash podcast that I just I love has been uh doing a series about sharks and uh why they're misunderstood, all the typical like radio lab sciencey stuff.

Yeah. And uh One of the reporters, uh Pat Walters, is obsessed with the song Baby Shark. Do Baby Shark do Right? Yes. And and it's one of those songs that like like my I mean, my kid was not a huge fan of it, but my kids really close friend. You've seen pictures of Nora. She's the one in the Batman outfit. Um, they um uh sh she would sing Baby Shark a lot when she was little. And it's it's funny 'cause it's fun to sing 'cause it's silly, but it's also funny because it's annoying. I think that's isn't that part of the fun, is that it's annoying? I mean I don't I don't really have a sharp. Mommy shark do do do do to do mommy shark do. You go through all the sharks. Have you ever had a kid sing baby shark at you?

It never ends. It goes on and on and on. I and I know. It's like it's raining tacos. It's one of those songs that just goes on and on and on. I'm not gonna ask about the reigning tacos. By Perry Grip. Um you know what you should do? Um when I was a kid, my uncle, so there there was a thing, I was the youngest of the kids in the family. My cousin I have one cousin well, unfortunately they're both passed away. Uh one cousin was five years older, one cousin ten years older. And my dad would buy Bobby and Davy like really annoying gifts for birthdays and Christmas and my uncle returned the favor when I was five by buying me a drum set. Like a like a legit one. I mean well like a child playing it doesn't matter if they're like Ring of Stars drums.

A little kid playing them is horrible. And what you should do, now that you got all these babies in your family, P-A-R-R-Y, G-R-I-P, I want to say, look up on Perigrip. Um, this guy used to be in a really good pop band called Nerf Herder. Um check out Perry Grip uh Raining Tacos. Yeah, Raining Tacos. Get those kids on Perry Grip songs, and it'll drive your siblings insane. You think baby shark's weird and annoying? Wow. It's raining tacos. I mean this is the kind of thing that the you should you should be jailed for this song. Um well funny you should say that, uh Merlin. I'm now on the Reigning Tacos Wikipedia page and it says under history. Hold hold on, Reigning Tacos was also adapted into a a book.

It was also featured on This Might Be a Podcast. And then, and then, the song along with Baby Shark. were used by the West Palm Beach authorities to deter homeless people from staying at a park during the n Right. You know, the there's um Those are three things that are We all we all know that the problem with middle-aged men is that they they think they're not appreciated. The problem with all middle-aged people is that they think they understand things. And so they think that's that's the kind of thing that makes sense to somebody who's like 45. You ever been around the sound that supposedly keeps teens away? It's it's it's been a joke. It was a joke on Thirty Rock, it's been a joke in uh lots of things.

But have you ever been around places where they play the sound that scares teens away? No. I didn't know. Uh there was a thing happening in urban especially in urban spaces. I feel like this might have been in Atlanta. But there's as you know your hearing uh hearing loses a lot of its high range as you age Uh I mean exclusive of even rock and roll and headphones, but like everybody loses that range. But there are there are tones that um people only under a certain age normally can hear. And so if they wanted to keep teens out of an area, they'd play this tone that only very young people can hear, and they play it really loud. And of course I couldn't hear it. I can't hear shit. I really uh want to try uh l listening to this.

Yes. Uh yeah, I always feel like I always feel like I'm doing it wrong. But I think it's helped. Can we watch a can we watch a video together and then do the challenge? Uh real quick, you under sol sold l literally uh this uh this d this device is a commercial device. It is called the mosquito and I d I thought l it was something like i you play over some speakers. No, this is a patented device. It's so it looks so so uh wait, please read the uh response uh the Where So the radio Radio Lab wanted Werner Herzog to Okay, I'll take it from here. That's not an oddball idea. What if this episode ended with Erna Herzog singing the baby shark song? So they wrote to him and 30 minutes later they get a response.

I'm not going to do the voice. Hi, Pat. Well no, well that was the whole thing. I I just wanted to hear a Merlin man, Werner Herzog, Alexander Skarzigar doing Werner Herzog, whichever you prefer. The last time I stood on these ignorant stones. Full of and with the and with the with the w with the with the what is it? And uh with the vinegar of the pompous. I agreed to do two projects. Bachelor nanny. Um instead I will take the time to cut in the real thing here. Here's a 40-second video I've sent you, and when you're ready, please tell me and we'll hit play together. Okay. Three, two, one, play. The enormity of of their flat brain. The enormity of their stupidity is just overwhelming. This is Vernon.

When you're out in the countryside and you see chicken, try to look a chicken in the eye with great intensity. And the intensity of stupidity that is looking back at you is just amazing. By the way, uh it's very easy to hypnotize a chicken. What? Uh they're very prone to hypnosis. One or two films I've actually shown that. And one time he hypnotized the entire cast of a movie. Sure. And one or two. I lo I love I love the way he is. I don't I mean it's obviously partly at least a bit, because he's aware of his thing, but also like you can tell he he thinks about things. I admire that I don't know if he thought about that. You think he just did that like strictly off the dome? I think he's probably thought about how fucking dumb chickens are.

They're not super bright. Uh well I I decided to I guess compared to other challenge this week is to um Uh I wanna get this right. Uh Challenges Week stemmed out of a thought technology that I've been playing around with and something I kind of accidentally came up with. Um And I want to find exactly what I said. I think um I'm gonna call this challenge try it again about 5% slower. And um shall I I mean, do you want to talk or should I say something? What? No, no, no. Oh no, I just don't I just don't know. I don't want to, you know. What does that mean? You don't want to What I realized sometimes is uh because you know this is this is part of uh uh a broader set of thought technologies that I'll just call stop I have a set of thought technologies that involves I've really I'm I've I've come to really not dislike, but I I'm trying to stop using the word mindfulness if it's not really what I mean.

I'm not really talking strictly about a Buddhist practice. I'm not talking about meditation. Instead of mindfulness Which w will work perfectly fine. If you prefer, you just insert the word mindfulness. The the phrase I prefer to mindfulness is what I would call presence of mind. A little bit more Midwestern way to put it, a little more plainly put, to have presence of mind. And when you're somebody who has ADHD and anxiety, uh like I do, uh, I found it useful for myself. To catch myself or to say stop and go like and sh like do a catch myself when something's going a direction I didn't expect or desire. and evaluate how I feel about that and then decide what to do about it. I mentioned this on Back to Work very, very early on.

The whole like thing the s th the general stop technology, the reason you snap yourself with that rubber band, is is to go like, wait a minute, you know, is this the thing we're supposed to be doing now? Is this feeling or this uh whatever's carrying me away right now that makes me not have presence of mind, is that useful to what it is I'm trying to do? And normally like you can just catch yourself and go, no, that's fine. You're just having fun. Go with it. Keep going. Or geez, Louise, dude, what's your problem? So that's the broader set of thought technologies that involves what I would call presence of mind. And here's what I realized recently in the last couple months. Sometimes I can catch myself.

And um gosh, I have so much to say about this. It's so hard to restrict this. I sometimes realize that My if I catch it, my brain is almost like a little like a flashing police light where there's just things swimming around in my head so much and I'm not even I'm not really thinking about them. but I'm s kind of thinking about them and just ideas are swirling around or I'm feeling overwhelmed. And I've just realized the the point of this challenge is to to do a form of this stop thought technology, which is to say to yourself, okay, hang on. Why don't we try that again, but about 5% slower? And here's the idea. I'll give you a very specific example. This is the way that I use this the most. This is so mundane.

Maybe some of you like me are a fucking idiot and you do stuff like you put something down and you don't know where you put it. Or maybe like me, uh, you're a fucking idiot and you don't remember why you came into a room. Or a completely different sort of thing. Maybe you're like me and you're a fucking idiot. And you just realize I'm wandering around and I'm not sure what it is that I'm doing right now. Or maybe like me, you're a fucking idiot, and you're like I'm not doing any of the stuff I'm supposed to be doing. I'm instead my my brain is just going like monkey mind, right? And then I do a soft version of that stop or pause and I say to myself, okay. Take a beat. And why don't we do what we were nominally like theoretically?

Let's retry what we were just doing, but let's do it about 5% slower. And we'll get we'll get to the how this why this works, I think, later, maybe. But um I'll tell you what, what if I'm trying to find something, I mislaid something in the house, like You know, it could be that like I'm I'm doing something with 3D printing and I'm moving between like three different things that I'm doing. I'm like over here, I'm taking things off the bed, over here I'm sanding things, like whatever. And I kinda lose track of where I am a little bit. And I say to myself, let's try that again about five percent slower. You would not believe how often I can quickly find something I've mislaid. If I say to myself, let's try that again about 5% slower.

Searching. And when I say searching, you know what that doesn't mean? That doesn't mean fucking sprinting around the house going, waah, where's my stuff? That's me, not you. But like but if I stop and I just go, let's try that again about five percent slower. Uh I found that to be a very effective exercise in helping me I mean obviously there's a trick to this that's kind of obvious, I guess, that we'll get to. But that was the challenge. And here's the thing. There's all kinds of ways you can do this in different ways. It could be five percent more or less of anything. The way I describe this to you in a text, I think, is In fact, I know. I think what I said to you is, and I like you ought to listen to this closely because I think it's kind of smart.

Um, instead of telling your body an answer, try asking your body a question. I'm gonna say that again. Instead of telling your body an answer, try asking your body a question. So like what do we do? We yell at ourselves and we tell ourselves to do better and we we we scream at ourselves about like Oh, I'm all anxious about blah or guy. That we get into. And sometimes you just you just gotta like hit that pause or hit that stop or hit that, you know. defer button and causing yourself to try it again about five percent slower has had slightly overwhelming success for me. And so to me, instead of telling your body how life is, ask your body how it feels And sometimes what I said to you in that text, and this is the really important part of this exercise, I feel like, um, that if you tell your body, if you ask your body, hey, how you feeling right now, bud, or like effectively, hey, what could you use five percent less of right now?

Don't tell your body what it needs five percent less of. Listen to what your body immediately, without even hardly being asked at all, tells you what you need five percent less of and your body consequently kind of your brain. I'm not running a Descartes. Like it will you will know. And in my case it might be I just need five percent of just running around like a the headless stupid Herzog chicken. Don't get hypnotized. Hertz off ch Hertzlock Chicken. I don't know how to say that in German. And so I suggested that and I know it's weird. It's the kind of weird thing that I do, but I thought you might enjoy it and might find it useful and I don't know. I thought you might find it revealing, honestly, because I found it to be revealing.

And after we've talked about your experience with this, I'll tell you why I think this works. If if you like, or you can tell me why you think it works. But what do you think of the challenge? Try it again about five percent slower Well, they weren't here for that, so say it like they didn't hear that. I uh it's It's a thought technology, but it it it it's a mind fuck and a curse because I always just Well thanks, I'm really glad you enjoyed it and found it useful. I always just tell myself I I always tell myself, calm down. But you uh already uh m mentioned the important part, which is asking yourself Yeah. Okay. W Let's try this again. Uh I mean you don't have to be you don't have to be a woman in America.

Um, it helps. You don't have to be a woman in America to be really tired of people telling you to calm down. Ye Um, I think it's very funny when you say that. And I it's one of my favorite quotes of yours, calm down. But it's also that like do you think your body and your mind feel any better being yelled at to calm down? Like some if it works, use it, but also just be careful that you're not becoming yet another voice that hates you. The that's part of why Calm Down has always uh helped me because The type of person I mean i again like you said, uh I've been and not me, but I've seen men tell uh women to calm down so often that that's almost like a different genre of of calm down for me. It was completely separate.

head, but the let's do you say it as a friend or do you hear and do you say it as a friend and hear it as a friend? Oh, depends on the thing. Who's the one who's saying who's the you and who's the who's the recipient and who's the uh Yeller I uh it used to be that the yeller was just the bad uh uh uh brain parts ch chiding me and uh over the years it's been a realization that that's not super healthy. So now it it's still an authority f figure but hopefully it's not the chicken or like lizard parts of the brain but the Uh I would like to think nice human part that uh wants me to just angry when you find yourself saying it to yourself. No. You know, you know, you know that helps and it's it's like it's useful to you.

It's just it becomes like a little reminder, like a little tap. Yes. And What cursed me about this was uh the 5% slower part because it's figuring out and asking yourself what exactly you need to uh uh calm down about or need to slow down is difficult and uh uh extremely helpful you really think sometimes it's just I found the opposite to be true. I found that that's why I said the thing about the body part, because it's it's amazing to me how quickly if I if I unhook the intellectual or Conscious mental part of my brain that's thinks it understands things. Like the guy's not as smart as he thinks he is. You know what I mean? And it's instead if I go like, oh, let's try to get about five percent slower.

You know, the same way that you would say like to somebody who's like learning a skill, you would say, okay, that's really good. And that was really good. And now let's pull all of those together. Here comes the kids. Um you you but you know what I mean? Like where you kind of cause yourself to go like, oh now, and let's just try and now let's try and do all those three moves all together smoothly. And you naturally kind of whether that's in like skiing or breakdancing or whatever, like you kind of have to you have to enter into like a slightly different state of mind rather than just like, right, I'm gonna flap my arms around and do the thing. It causes you to really slow down. Mm-hmm. And it also though when you're slowing down like a specific amount and trying to do that.

Well that's part of the trick. It's kind of made up. It's a made-up number. But that's now it's now it's like in my head and the the part two of Making your body like t talking to your body what I struggle with is the part that i is like, okay. Intellectually, I know this is not a good thing I am thinking or feeling, uh, but I don't know exactly what I can do to try this against lower because I don't know is it because of something I g can't necessarily help, like if it is this a chemical thing going on with my brain that I just know that I I I need to ride out or So it sounds like it might potentially kinda stress you out a little bit. Um it at first. How do curses generally make you feel? Uh the well uh it's like a Buddhist gift, you know.

It's like the show. Sometimes it's a little girl yelling at you in the parking lot. And sometimes you're Nathan Fielder flying up in the sky. Sometimes it's chickens and sometimes it's just feathers. Yes. Um The the five like I know the five percent w wasn't the the main part, but I I think when you're like, okay, five percent slower, then you need to recognize which parts n need to be slow. Like, okay, you're you're running around finding. Do you have any examples you'd be comfortable sharing of when this was particularly interesting or helpful? Like I gave the example of looking for something, like on my desk. Or like the where like it's probably like right in front of me, as my grandmother used to say, one of her less again, one of her less racist remarks, if it was a snake, it would have bit me.

She used to say. I w I was trying to find a good example that uh doesn't involve uh stuff people don't want to hear about. That's why I think for the but the finding something it does does also work because you still need to find something in a certain amount of time. Like you still need to find your keys before you're late to the other. Well here let's put here's another way. Just if if I were gonna be like like an idiot about this, which I probably am, let's put it another way. Hey, you can't find your stuff Hey, fuck you. Let's go 30% faster and see if that helps. And maybe it will. Like maybe just the change. I mean there's certainly there's just something to be said about change that that can be really useful to you.

But like I I it's just that the the the slower part is something that tells my brain gently whatever that percentage is. Um but no, so you you I'm not hung up necessarily, but you find yourself a little fixated on what five percent of something looks like. Uh in a given situation. The fix yeah, the f the fixation was became a frustration of like, okay, what exactly uh But you get that that was not the intention though, right? Right. No, no, no, right. But then it ended up being like, okay, I don't know what I can s how to slow down, but I do know that there are healthy things I can do to speed this up. So maybe I don't even need to d try also just might not be helpful for you. Right. So that became uh just a like, you know what, I am going to stop looking for this thing because I yes, it needs to get done, but there are three other things that I can do first.

And so it's a good thing. Yeah, and of course then you can you can your your your more rational mind can engage at any point. And that's kind of in some ways what you're doing is you're just trying to move to second order thinking in some ways. You're you're getting out of the first order like blah blah walking around running into walls condumin way of thinking. And more in that second order sort of like I have to really focus on this and think about w what this question means. That's a lot of in a second I'm gonna explain whether it's a lot of people. Well, I I was going to say I want to hear more of what you you uh I know that you want to say more about this and uh because uh part of the slowing down was like I know that I can't I sh and shouldn't fixate on the five percent That is not the point.

Yeah, I mean the rational part can always go like, oh, is this a gating factor to what I'm doing right now? A gating, you know, is this is this like a milestone element where I can't move on until I find this thing? you know, sort of like could I just put in TKTK and come back to this later type thing versus it's just i if you're like how I am, I don't know how to put this in a way that'll make sense to a uh anybody, but knowing how I am, I benefit from occasional disruptions to my mind running amok. Such Uh like your own disrup when you say destruction. Something I've I've said for a long time that is just put this in my museum of nearly meaningless things to say. Uh a frustration I used to have in talking about tips and tricks, talking about life hacks, something I continue to be frustrated about is that, you know, I can I can provide what I consider to be lots of good tips and tricks about stuff I could even, if necessary, explain why I think that's useful or pr more saliently, like why I that worked for me, or I feel like that's been helpful for me, but what I what I can't give somebody That nobody can give to anybody is presence of mind.

And if you want to call that mindfulness, that's totally fine. I don't object to that. It's just that I don't I don't want I don't want people to think that you have to become some kind of like, um, you have to wear like a saffron robe and wander around the airport to to have self-help in life. Presence of mind to me is a perfectly formulent American way to say, I just I need to be aware that I'm alive and I'm doing things and that I am the driver of this ultimately. Uh and that's why I find those kinds of little with my monkey mind I find useful. So here's two quick things. Number one, um The place that I spent junior high and high school in Central Florida. Um just a little bit south of us, doesn't really matter.

But there was um a new park that opened in the early 80s called Booker Creek. It was a really cool little park. It was really nice because it was easy to get to and you could like, you know, be somewhere kind of woodsy, you know, even though you're in Central Florida, right? And one of the things I thought was so interesting about Booker Creek Park was when you enter the park, they have those, you know, rough-hewn signs, kind of like a national park, like those wooden signs. So like their stop sign is like a wooden stop sign. And their speed limit signs are like wooden speed limit signs. And you know what the speed limit in the park is? Um at the the highest speed that you're supposed to travel in the park.

It says on the big wooden sign very brightly as you're driving through the park, it says uh speed limit nine miles per hour. Oh, that's good. And I know we're all really smart, you know, and we know this, but let's let me just explain the joke. Why is that useful? If you posted 10 miles per hour People will be less likely to notice it. People will be less likely to notice it, let alone follow it. But if you see nine miles per hour, your brain is much more likely to notice it and consequently is more capable of following the rule. It's it's kind of broken through the din of rectangular signs that begin with speed limit and end with a whole number. So, I mean whether that works or not, I don't know.

I'll leave it to the to the researchers about whether or not that works. I will tell you this, that for me There's something about specificity, even if it's a specificity that seems a little bit arbitrary or cute, that I find really Helpful. So I'll give you an example from one of the great characters of this show, uh Dennis Gephardt. And Dennis would do something that I I picked up on. and not only loved but operationalized and then eventually started spreading which is if you want something to happen on time um come up with a very specific time. Hear me out. I know this sounds crazy. But like Dennis would say, okay, you know, we're supposed to go meet the girls for dinner at, you know, at the place at seven.

He says, you know, uh, let's leave here at 6. 13. And for for a while, yeah, whatever, okay, I get it, that's cute. Uh I'm the kind of person who like, oh, I don't uh I don't need speed limit signs. I don't need clock. Well ask your friends how good you are at all of that. If you think you're good at at conolingous multitasking or being on time for things, ask around. six thirteen, not six fifteen, not six, six thirteen. First of all, sticks in your head a little bit better. You give it to somebody else, and if they're the sort of person who's open to showing up on times for things, you give them a very specific thing. They're much more likely to remember that. And consequently, the same way that you're more likely to notice that sign in Booker Creek, which then makes you more able now having noticed it, you're more likely to follow it.

Because how can you follow it if you never noticed it? And how can you leave on time if you're not really sure what time we're leaving? All I know is it was it's some top of the hour or bottom of the hour. So why'd I say 5%? I don't know. That's just what came into my head. But it's not critical. It's not critical to the success of this. You could just say let's slow down. If that works for you, that's great. I find that less sticky than something specific. So for me, the 5% part is getting into some Dennis Gaphart levels of specificity to like wire around the part of my brain that thinks it's smart. And nobody ever thinks this is true, but that's your biggest problem, listener, is you think you're fucking smart.

And so you've created an entire world in which you you've got this this surfeit, this constellation of of confirmation biases that are constantly proving to you th that you've made good decisions in the past. Which, you know, that and 11 bucks will buy you a coffee. Uh fucking calm down and give yourself some specificity and act like a fucking person and until you're good at it. Then go back to saying 6 o'clock or 6. 15. Anyway, that's why I say specificity. Second point, this is very subtle and very stupid and very obvious. When we think about things like meditation, you know, which is so difficult to talk about because you're talking about this interior world that really kinda defies unless literally unless you literally have like circus music playing in your head, it's probably pretty hard to explain your internal world world to other people.

I struggle with it, right? But you know, I mentioned a bit a bit ago, like sometimes I think I think it's helpful sometimes to visualize these things. When I think about my brain being like a police light or a blender with things spinning around, sometimes that blender spins at different speeds Sometimes there's different contents in the blender. But what I'm trying to say is that sometimes I'm not even aware that my head's spinning with ideas or that I'm feeling my shoulders moving up because I'm getting more anxious about what? I don't know. I catch myself, my the fucking blender is spinning. It's no wonder my shoulders are going up to my ears. It's no wonder I'm stressing out. It's no wonder I'm having anxiety.

Let me dumb all of this all the way down. Point number one specificity helps. Here's point number two. Just for the sake of this model, act like you have two minds. Act like you have a mind that runs perhaps of its own accord, but runs. Like an almost not autonomic, but like you've got you've got how you think about things. And that's that dumb, terrible, careless, childlike mind where you think anxious thoughts, or where you do silly things, or where you get distracted. Or you don't realize until two PM that you've been emotional about something really negative all day. All those kinds of things were that child dumb part of your brain just runs around. And then but then there's the other part of your brain that decides or notices sometimes that something needs to be done about something.

I guess what I'm trying to say is it's not totally dissimilar from meditation, but in this presence of mind, there's whatever's happening over here with your blender brain. And then there's this part of you over here that could potentially have a role in noticing and interceding or advising in that context. So Some of my favorite advice I've ever heard about meditation, again, very allied to this. Imagine that you're standing, this is I think Steve Hagan might have said this, but um If you want to understand a mental model for meditation, well, here's my two favorites. Number one, imagine that you're standing on a bridge, looking down at a river. And you can see the river. You can think of a r of like a body of water where you enjoy standing on a bridge and looking down, like in a park, like uh whatever works for you.

If But you see the water rushing by, maybe you see some fish. you see the little rocks and you think about how the rocks are different colors and you wonder, gosh, how's that plant able to live underwater and still thrive? And see all that water going by. Your goal when you're meditating is to be able to look at the water without jumping in. That's really it. So there's the river and there's you in that model, right? Put a pin in that. Other one I heard, I think from probably a headspace meditation. Imagine that you're standing on like a on a uh maybe you're like an LA or something. You're maybe up on a hill looking down at freeways going by And you're you're watching the freeways and you're thinking, oh man, it's really crazy that it's it's really busy in this one direction and it's even busier in that direction and there's gridlock over there and Look how many cars are white nowadays.

God, there used to be more green cars when I was a kid. Isn't that weird? There's all these white and you see all those cars. Here's another way to look at meditation. 2B. Um be able to look at a freeway full of cars without opening the door and getting into any of them. So number one, we're gonna learn to stand on a bridge and watch the water going by without jumping into it. Number two we're going to be able to watch cars driving by without getting into any of them. Okay? Now you can decide for yourself whether those are useful. And I I find them useful and I'm going to tell you why. Because I'm at least in there is a model of my mind that I find useful. Which is there's sometimes there's the running around part and there's the observing part.

The observing part, that's the part that can totally just enjoy looking at the water without feeling the need to jump in. And I think that's kind of what I'm doing here. The part of the part that, and again, it's not like one side's good and one side's bad. It's all the same brain, but like this is it's a model. It's only a model. It's just a model. You but you look and you go like uh you know what? I could look at a I could look at a a stream all day without jumping in. I could look at cars drive by all day without jumping in. Well then why is it so difficult to meditate? Why is it so difficult to catch myself Realizing that I've fallen far short of the better angels of my nature. Why am I being this way?

And that's where the presence of mind, I think, can come in. Whatever you decide to do with your presence of mind is up to you. What I'm saying is if you develop a little bit of presence of mind, and a lot of you will be better at this faster than I am and may not even need a model, but you probably do. What I and I Allah, those meditation ideas, that specificity, the presence of mind part is A, let's get specific, nine miles per hour, and B, just try not to get in the leak, just try not to get into the stream. So what if you had two parts of your mind and one of them occasionally reminds you it's okay to watch what the other one is doing without getting emotionally involved in it? 'Cause you only you don't have infinite it's not an infinite number of minds that can keep getting increasingly more anxious about it.

Can't you sometimes see that blender of activity and emotion? Can't you sometimes see that rushing stream? Can't you even see that thousand car pile up and look at it without becoming involved in it, especially emotionally. And when you catch that That's a form of if you like mindfulness, but it's it's absolutely on a more practical level, it's definitely to me, in a way I find useful and generative, it's definitely a form of self-awareness and presence of mind. And that's why I think it's kind of neat and useful. And it doesn't have to be 5%. It doesn't have to be slower. It doesn't have to be any of those things. But it's just a more gentle way of letting that second mind, watch something without feeling the need to get involved in it.

You can or or you know, think about therapists. You know, your therapist isn't really supposed to like you. They're supposed to help you. Well, I want my therapist to like me, but the therapist wants to help. I mean if they're a good therapist. And it's kind of similar here where it's like, well, let's do what's best for a little guy today. For Blender Brain over here. Title. Um that's okay, so that was my long my long rant on that. Presence of mind. Okay, I am good at this, or at least I am getting better at this and I can i improve on my model or or whatever. I mean I think of my brain, or not even brain, just the whole life as like an emotional frogger of you need to watch things pass by and not get emotionally evo evolved, and you can't jump on the log or get in the truck But eventually uh a semi is going to come and just steamroll you.

What's the semi analogy? Uh the oh s like a family tragedy or somebody. It can be A a semi can be like a material um s see pass someone passing away is a material and an emotional dump truck. So the So that that is a a dumb truck, but l let's say a semi is uh literally a a semi hits you in your car and you have all of your frog things. Now uh well you're but yes, but you're driving your own car. So it's driving a frog car. Your frog, it's it's adorable. Uh but but how does someone get to the point where they're like, all right, I am getting a little bit better at this and I uh know that I am slowing down in the right ways. I don't exactly understand that question, but I'm gonna try and answer it anyway.

Um I I uh I don't really understand the frame for that, but cause it okay if I just give some examples instead. Mm-hmm. Getting frustrated with kids. Like if you've got if you've got or or pets for that matter, or just getting frustrated with people You know, sort of like the whole this is water thing, speaking of frogs. But um, if you catch yourself becoming emo emotional especially There might be other names for that, or other ways you put that, but irrational or emotional. Let's call it emotional. You can catch yourself sometimes. And if you were to say to yourself, let's try that again about five percent slower, or whatever Um, you might go, Oh, as much as I hate this little piece of shit, this is just a little kid.

And even if they are trying to do this to annoy me, which they're probably not. People are not changing their avatars to t to trap you and people are not are not being the way they are specifically to bug you. And what if there's a universe where even if they were doing that just to bug you, it still wouldn't bug you? Is that a future you can ever imagine? I'm not asking you, I'm just saying in general. Hypothetically, that's one. Can I give you an even dumber one? Um, I don't know why I have these certain analogies that just always uh, you know, a website is a house, you know, um a relationship is a kitchen. I've got this kind of like Lake off sort of ideas about thing. USB A. One thing I've been saying for a long time, and I think I put this in the document.

When you get a plug-in in USB A, act like you're going to get it right on the first time Act like you know how to plug in a USB A male into USB A female and act like it's going to work on the first try. I can tell you, especially if you're doing that like without looking, and most of us are, if you're trying to plug in a USB A without thinking, I can tell you there's an approximately almost exactly 50% chance it'll work the first time. Here's the thing. Being timid, because there's quote only a 50% chance of it working, being timid about how you do it, turns out that's much more likely to lead you to three attempts rather than one. If you act like you know how to plug in a USB A and it will work the first time, you will know within a nanosecond if you need to flip it over.

And then when you do flip it over, it'll go straight in. Act like you know what you're doing. Right? And then if all else fails, even if you've had 16 times in a row, you got it wrong, well, give yourself a break, obviously, and kind of go like, oh, you. You know, you maybe you'll do better next time. But going into it with that slightly different state of mind, um I tend to not say things like this. It'll make you a happier person. Now, yes, this is a true example, but it's also an analogy It's also a thought technology. These are things that you can apply on any level you want. I'm not actually giving you tips and tricks on how to plug things in quicker. Believe it or not, that's not actually what this tip and trick is about.

Oh, that was the other thing I was going to come back to. Is that the frustrating part to me is that the tips or tricks the tips and tricks are all bullshit, unless you understand the philosophical underpinning for why you've been shitty at it your whole life. There's no tip or trick that will help you until you understand why you got bad at where you at getting to where you are now. Tips and tricks will not get you out of that. You need to you get your mind right, as Tuther Martin would say. Um and so like I know that sounds nuts, but what if you're what if you're in a hurry, right? What if that's a thumb drive? that has the Henderson report on it, which was due yesterday, and everything's late and you're not even sure if it's in the right format.

And oh my God, I don't even know if this is the right USB drive. Fuck. Right? Not you, but like you you've probably heard of people who are like ah This has gotta go in some way. Did they change it? Is it is it is Do I do it on a diagonal now? Why can't I get the USB? What the fuck is wrong with me? Hey, let's try that again about 5% slower. Floop, it goes right in. And if it doesn't, you flip it over and you're done. Why did I say sometimes it won't be as two tries, it'll be three? It might be five or seven or eight or twelve because you're just doing it wrong and you're mad at yourself and you know the Henderson report is late and so you're going. Hey, let's try thinking about five percent slower And you're gonna feel your shoulders go down.

You're gonna you if you're me, now be ready because cause here's the line. Oh you or hey You'll get it next time. We incline ourselves to being easier on ourselves. I don't know why I don't do this for a living. I'm so fucking good at this. But you go a little bit easier on yourself and you say, even though I know There's this is the problem with 50%, is because the partner of 50% is also 50%. It's not technically asexuality or um, you know, auto- auto-erotic. But the thing is that's half half full and half empty. There's no more half full and half empty than 50% chance. Now I got a tip. Can I give you a tip? Here's a tip. I've got some of those really cool cables that go from a USB A. There's a Belkin.

I know you guys love your tips. Belkin makes a really good connector that I like. And it goes from a on one end it's a USB A mail And then at the end, at the other end, it's got a USB mini, whatever the little trapezoid one is. But then the trapezoid can accommodate an adapter that's already attached on a little little piece of rubber that you can turn, go from USB A, and then you can put that either the USB-C onto the Mini or a Lightning onto the Mini. But we're kind of we've got the same problem at this point, which is When's the last time you got USB Mini right on the first try? Like, oh my god, it sucks. You know what I do? Um, all those cables. Uh I I I I will plug in, for example, the USB-C.

And you know what I'm talking about, right? It's an adapter. You put the USB-C onto that little mini, and you know what I do? I take a Sharpie, a metallic Sharpie, and I make a very small line that crosses both of those pieces of the device. So that the little the little black nubby that has the USB Mini and the little nubby that has the USB C regular USB-C on it There's now a system that shows me where the lines should line up. I do it often enough that I don't want to dick around with it. That's a great tip because now you can look and see, oh, I I'll get this right every single time. That's the tip. The tip is If it's something you need to get right like that, I mean, and really there's so few things that are that for example, one problem with USB A, it's got it's in, it's mounted into the device in different directions on every drive.

I don't know if there's a correct, proper, like like industry standard, but I in my experience it is inconsistent which way the USB A goes. So you can't fix that problem. But in the case of this little dongus that I attach, I can I'll send you a photo if you want. You can see right here, like I've marked it so that it's really clear that when I see the little copper line. If I see the copper line on on on this part on not on that part, well Turn it over, dummy. I've fixed it. That's your tip. That's your trick. It will not save you from how fucking frustrated you're gonna be. when you go to plug the USB A into something and it doesn't go in on the first try and now you're mad at yourself. So I just gave you a great tip or trick.

But then I also brought you the harsh reality of how you can't beat your brain if your brain sucks. And the only way out of that, it's not to dig yourself in further and decide that you're entitled to your fucking anger. And all of your like bitterness. You think that doesn't come out when you try to plug in a USB A? I'll show you what kind of person you are when you don't get USB A right the first time. Believe me, I can see. And when you see me do it and I get it wrong, do I yell at myself? Nope, I go, ah, you'll get it next time, buddy. And ultimately, who fucking cares? It's a USB A plug. It doesn't matter. But let's just say it's just an analogy. Does that ever happen in your life, folks?

Does that ever happen where you run across something where like you have outsized like fucking things are always undermining me? Like you ever you ever get mad at a door? Are you crazy, man? That's like a 50-year-old piece of wood and you're mad at it. Like presence of mind is what lets us catch ourselves in those moments. Incline ourselves toward a gentle approach. And then to have whatever trick it takes to have that presence of mind reflected in what you're doing. And for me, sometimes that means, hey, bud, let's try that again about 5% slower. No, you say something. No, let's sting out there. I don't care. You uh have been talking about so so often that you think want people to help or change or like give me some thoughts on that.

Like does that have any impact on how you think about this thing you've called a curse? Not that I'm mad, but I'm just like, does that does any of that like you used to like when I said things like this? Does it do you find this useful? Well how does it how does it have an impact on how you think, Alex? And how you see, how you decide, how you do, how you assair. Well, a lot of the stuff you say about anger and uh the especially the like the USB A stuff That I do know is something I am good at because I have other things to be angry about and upset about and you wish. So do Oh yeah. So like yeah, I'm sure you're really good at making sure you're only angry about the right thing at the right time.

No, I'm I'm saying that I've lurr I've have been able to recognize when something well, I don't have a lot of experience with things that are just Just the the tip. Uh but it's I think what you have done is at least s for me a lot of not I mean not just in the past, but through our like ac actual friendship and what you still do is r just recognizing how you need to go into something like you aren't going to jump into the freeway and uh just I used to think of it as like bracing for a blow. We're like there's times in life where you're bracing for a blow. Maybe you're in the middle of a fight. Or maybe there's somebody in your life who's gets physical with you, but like that is feeling a post-trauma feeling that stays with us.

I will do anything I can to never feel that feeling again. Right. And that can become so overwhelming. And once you key that once you start realizing how much that hose is attached to the giant hose of angry, bitter resentment that most people fail to realize they're walking around with. Woof. Mm-hmm. I know that I will always uh not not always, but like actually yeah. Um most people will always have a rational uh anger or just i irrational frustration or anxiety, but it's being able to at least recognize that and be even if you can't go slower, it's there's an opportunity to go slower in the future. And I think just recognizing it. Yes. I It's difficult, but it helps you. Do the best you can every day.

And dwelling on that d dwelling on the times that I've been a I don't know, uh f angry about the USB A not going in, that does not help, nor is it rational at all. There there are I mean for for for people that I like nubbin. What? Sorry. I just like the nubbin. I like the word nubbin. I didn't mean it myself. I love the word nubbin. No, no, no. It's a really good word. But like it's um Again, welcome to Theater of the Obvious title. That's pretty good. Welcome to Theater of the Obvious. Um But when you cast not I'm not please don't answer this question, but I'd just like you and the listeners to think about it, because I think about it. Um if you were to think about the moments you're particularly proud of in the last 20 years, how many of them are moments where you were irrationally angry?

And we might say again, theater of the obvious, right? Have a seat. Get some popcorn. But like have you really thought about that, guys? Like that you're the moments where you we rarely feel more confident. We rarely feel more sureness. We rarely feel more entitlement. We rarely feel more like somebody's fucking got it coming than when we as Dennis Gephardt used to say, when we let our witch out. And when when when you get mad and you yell at the person, or sometimes you yell at yourself, how many times in the last twenty years How many are in your top five or moments where you acted like a real piece of shit because you thought you had every right to act like a piece of shit? And if you could go back and have presence of mind or the things that you not not not to make you feel bad or like have, you know, intrusive thoughts, but you know.

Aren't there times that you where you would go back and be like, if I could have done that about five percent slower, I bet I would have handled that better? That's a bell. I've stung you. We're dinging out. We should really ding out. No, that was it. Chickens are stupid. I don't think so. No. Because they're not. They're really smart. They're so smart. I'm frustrated with Werner Herzog be Oh. Because chicken and pigs are are really smart. S m pigs are smarter, but you know It's your belief that chickens are smarter. Yes. Okay. After show we're gonna need to talk about that. Because how many chickens have you met? Have you ever met a chicken? Yes. I m met one this or yeah, I met a bunch this weekend.

They're very they're smart and they are frustrating. I can't wait to hear how you discovered that they're smart. Are you talking because you can like play tic-tac-toe with them at a carnival? You know they're being electrocuted when that's happening. Oh God, no. No. I didn't know that. I didn't know that. I never thought it looked like a fun game. But if you go somewhere and you see a chicken and you play tic-tac-toe with the chicken for a quarter And you know, say, what's that little wire attached to its leg? Maybe that saw it won't run away. Well, that's because there's a little microcomputer, well, whatever preceded computers, that's telling the chicken whether to do an X or an O and where.

Mm-hmm. Yeah, they're not like the clip cloppy makeup mechanical turduccin. The turk I got nothing. raw transcript